


j't'emmène au vent

by gawain_in_green



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Crack that very rapidly descends into angst, Elias Is Jonah, Gen, Possession, Psychological Horror, References to Drugs, This is going to get jossed real quick
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-29
Updated: 2019-09-29
Packaged: 2020-11-01 07:54:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,270
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20811665
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gawain_in_green/pseuds/gawain_in_green
Summary: “Ah,” says Jonah, through lips that used to be Elias’. “I’m going to be making somechangesaround here.”----If Elias is Jonah, then what happened to the original Elias Bouchard?





	j't'emmène au vent

**Author's Note:**

> shout out to @InhumanByte for beta-ing once more!  
i made a joke about this on tumblr and then got inspired to write a fic about it  
also ive never done a weed in my life and i have no interest in doing one so i hope you enjoy this very uneducated take on stoner elias :P

The first time Elias Bouchard meets Jonah Magnus, he’s stone-cold sober and wishes he wasn’t. Artefact Storage is always slightly colder than is comfortable; slightly colder than the rest of the building, and his pink polo shirt leaves him with goosebumps from the shoulders down. He’s got the beginnings of a headache from a night out on the town, and all in all he’s hardly prepared to meet the man who’s going to kill him. 

The photograph on the front of the journal is dusty, speckled with age, and Elias accidentally drops a bit of Fry’s on it before hastily smudging it away. He takes another bit of chocolate as he regards the portrait. The man is unremarkable-- plain, even, and his clothes look slightly shabby. For all that, he’s levelling the camera with the kind of look it takes generations of Oxbridge ancestors to produce. Flipping the picture over, Elias sees the name written on the back.  _ Jonah Magnus.  _

“Huh,” he says out loud. Then he crumples up his Fry’s wrapper and chucks it aimlessly behind him. 

There’s a green moleskin journal tucked under the photo, and Elias is about to shove it in his filing box without a closer look when he remembers his instructions for the day: under no circumstances, no, none at all, is he ever supposed to look inside any of the books in the Artefact Storage room. 

“Screw you, Gilbert, you chav,” he says, and opens the book. 

It doesn’t feel like someone else in his head. Not at first. That first day, it feels like there’s a layer of oil inside his skin, moving and churning and pushing out against the world. 

_ Oh,  _ says a voice, and it sounds like it comes from all around,  _ it doesn’t look like anyone will miss you at all.  _

“What,” says Elias, and then, “wzzzle.”

_ Hmm,  _ the voice says _ , you’re eating chocolate in my Institute. In my Artefact Storage, to be precise.  _

Various syllables that have been flailing vaguely on Elias’ tongue finally form together into some sort of cohesion. “Who,” he says, “are you?”

_ I suppose you might call me your boss.  _

Elias snorts. “You’re not my boss. James Wright is my boss, and he’s practically a mummy but he isn’t a ghost. I would know if he was a ghost.”

_ I’m not a ghost either _ , the voice says, somewhat petulantly.  _ Ghosts aren’t real, actu-- _

“If you’re not a ghost,” says Elias, with the air of someone proudly debunking the theory of General Relativity, “then why can’t I see you?”

There’s a pause. 

_ Alright, fine, I’m a ghost. Does that make you  _ ** _happy?_ **

Elias thinks about it. “Nah,” he says, and reaches into his gladstone for some Monster Munch. 

_ Don’t--  _ says the ghost--  _ please-- don’t eat whatever that is in Artefact Storage.  _

“Why?”

_ You’re going to get everything dirty. There will be so much paperwork for you to fill out about how you vandalized Institute property.  _

“Eh,” Elias says, “James doesn’t really bother with the paperwork.”

This time the pause is so long that Elias almost wonders if the spirit has gone, but when it finally speaks the timbre of its voice almost blinds him as it echoes through the rafters.

** _HE DOESN’T BOTHER WITH THE PAPERWORK?_ **

“Not much,” he gasps, once the ringing in his ears has faded down.

_ Oh,  _ says the voice,  _ Elias Bouchard. Do you know what we’re going to do together? _

“Uh,” says Elias, “no?”

_ We’re going to  _ ** _kill _ ** _ James Wright.  _

“I don’t, uh, I don’t really do murder.”

This seems to puzzle the ghost.  _ You don’t? Why not? _

“Too much work, really.”

_ Do you know who I am? _

“No.” Elias thinks about it for a second, and then thinks about what time it is, and how he only has forty minutes left on his shift and no one would really miss him if he decided to go pursue alternate avenues of entertainment. “And I don’t really care. Now I’m going to go get stoned, do you want to come?”

_ Do I-- what? _

“Do you want to come get stoned with me?”

_ I beg your pardon? _

“You’re clearly no fun,” says Elias, and closes the book. All of a sudden the oily sensation sloughs off of him, and the voice is quiet. He shrugs, grabs his gladstone, and heads out the door. 

It’s another week before he opens the journal again, mostly out of boredom and out of a subtle conviction that Gilbert would tell him not to. 

_ Oh _ , the voice says, after a moment,  _ that’s what you meant by ‘stoned.’ _

Elias nods happily. 

_ Are you on the clock?  _ And then, when the answer is evident:  _ I don’t have any jurisdiction over what my employees do in their own time, but I would appreciate it if you were fully attentive to your work during paid time.  _

"Hey,” says Elias, vaguely, “who are you?”

_ I’m Jonah Magnus.  _

This takes a moment to sink in, but when it does he sits bolt upright. “What?!” he squawks. 

_ Yes.  _

“What are you doing stuck inside a book?”

_ An old friend decided to take… direct action.  _

“That wasn’t nice of him.”

_ No,  _ says Jonah,  _ it wasn’t.  _

“I can, uh, I can help you get out of the book if you like.”

_ That would be very nice of you.  _

“Alright, what do I need to do?”

_ It’s simple enough. You need to destroy the book.  _

“I have a lighter here!” says Elias, pleased to feel useful for once in his life. 

_ Nononono,  _ says Jonah, with a tone approaching panic,  _ definitely not that. Think of all the ashes there will be. I would hardly be free at all. _

“So what should I do?”   


Jonah tells him. 

“Huh?”

Jonah tells him again. 

“That’s weird,” says Elias. 

_ Not that weird. Not compared to you.  _

_ _ “Should I use barbeque sauce, or something?”

_ Please don’t.  _

“What, so, just--” he mimes shoving something into his mouth and chewing. 

_ Yes.  _

“The whole book?”

_ The title page should do it.  _

“Alright,” says Elias doubtfully, then lifts the book up to his face and takes a hesitant bite out of the first page. “Blergh.” He tries to swallow the bite of paper and only just forces it down. “That’s disgusting. I’m not doing that again.”

_ Why not? _ says Jonah, and now his voice comes from inside Elias’ head. 

“Because it tastes disgusting!”   


_ Too bad. Take another bite.  _

Fortunately Elias is saved by the Artefact Storage door slamming open, and an irritated voice calling down. 

“Elias!” says Emma, “what on earth are you still doing here?”

He doesn’t say anything.  _ Say something _ , says Jonah. He still doesn’t. Emma really is very pretty. 

“We needed the small enamel box on the eastern wall. You were supposed to have given it to Cara an hour ago.” She squints down at him. “Elias? Are you alright?”   


“Your hair,” he manages, feebly, “it looks like a sunflower.”

She frowns. “Good Lord, get a life. Someday we’re going to get a new boss who won’t let you smoke on the job. Can you just get the box and give it Cara? That’s all we need.” She turns, and the door clicks shut behind her. 

_ Well done,  _ says Jonah, nastily. 

“Oh, fuck off.”

_ I don’t think I will. There’s plenty of empty space in your head.  _

And that’s how it starts. Suddenly, everything that is Jonah’s voice expands, and he can feel him watching from Elias’ eyes, listening from Elias’ ears, and sifting through the slow, meandering thoughts that occasionally percolate through Elias’ mind. It doesn’t hurt, not then, and he’s still in charge of bodily autonomy. That first day, he’s too high to get very concerned, and the attitude trickles into the day after that as well. It’s almost a month later when he finally decides to google Jonah Magnus that he starts to get nervous. 

“You weren’t very nice,” he says. “What’s this about a prison?”

_ Trust me, Elias,  _ says Jonah wryly,  _ I was only tangentially involved in the prison. To be honest, I think it’s the murders that might upset you more. _

“You weren’t joking about that?” yelps Elias. Michael Shelley, sitting across from him at the library table, shoots him a perplexed look. He continues more quietly, “I thought you were joking about that.”

_ About the murders? No.  _

“How many?”   


_ Not that many. It’s not very convenient, you know. Blood is astoundingly hard to wash off.  _

“That’s-- that’s not nice.”

_ No,  _ says Jonah, and Elias can practically hear the smile,  _ I suppose it isn’t.  _

Elias thinks about it miserably, and decides the best solution is to get drunk and try not to think about the evil ghost of a 19th century demonologist living in his head. 

_ You don’t want to be hungover for work tomorrow,  _ says Jonah disapprovingly. 

“‘s Friday,” mumbles Elias, burying his face in his hands. “No work on Saturdays.”

_ Oh Lord. It’s been ages since I was in the head of someone who paid attention to overtime.  _

“Saturdays are my days,” says Elias, “and you can’t have them. I’m getting drunk and that’s that. And you get to get drunk with me.”

Jonah is silent, which Elias takes for assent. After all, it’s almost the weekend. There’s nothing he can really do about it. 

Months pass. The journal still sits in Artefact Storage, and Elias checks on it every so often to make sure it’s still there. Occasionally Jonah makes suggestive comments regarding how tasty the rest of the opening page looks, and Elias always roundly ignores him. 

Or rather, he ignores him until James Wright lectures Elias in front of the entire Filing department. Elias barely even knows what he’s done wrong, aside from having the vague suspicion it has something to do with how much smoke there is in the third-floor men’s room. And James Wright has the nerve, the absolute  _ gall  _ to stand there and lecture him (him!) about professionalism and propriety and etiquette. As though he doesn’t have a degree in PPE from Oxford! 

_ You got a Third from Christchurch,  _ points out Jonah mildly, as this indignant thought crosses Elias’ mind. 

“I was busy,” Elias mutters. 

“You were  _ busy? _ ” repeats James Wright. “You were busy with what, exactly, Elias?”

Everyone is staring at him. The whole Filing team. Why are they all looking at him? He hasn’t done anything wrong. 

“I was, uh, busy in Artefact Storage.”

“Your work ethic this year has, quite frankly, been abominable. And your use of recreational substances on the clock is unacceptable. I will be keeping an eye on you, Elias,” says James. Then, energy apparently exhausted, he wilts slightly. “Have a good day, everyone. Keep up the good work,” he says, half-heartedly, and toddles off back to his office. 

His colleagues are all still staring. As Elias watches helplessly, Derek turns to Mohsen and whispers something into his ear. Mohsen chuckles, and Elias feels mortified and furious. Finally, when the tension is too much, he storms out the door of the Filing room and, at a loss for where to go, finds himself trotting down the hallway to Artefact Storage. 

_ I can help you,  _ says Jonah eventually.  _ I know how angry you are.  _

“What? What can you do? I’m a failure. I only got my degree at all because my mate Michael was the Chancellor’s son. I don’t know anything about anything.”

_ Oh, Elias,  _ says Jonah, almost fondly,  _ I know that. After all, I know everything about everything.  _

Somehow, he’s in front of the journal. He doesn’t know how he got there. He doesn’t remember walking down the stairs. “Jonah?” he says, with a sudden sensation of dread. 

_ Hm? _

“What are you?” 

_ What do you mean? _ _   
_

“You’re not just a ghost, are you? Or rather, you weren’t just a human when you were alive.”

_ What an interesting idea,  _ says Jonah, and he sounds almost proud.  _ Would you like to find out? Would you like to know things that even James Wright doesn’t know? _

“Yes,” breathes Elias, and he tears off the title page and swallows it whole. 

For a split second, he sees  _ everything _ . Everything there is to know in the whole world he knows, and it is beautiful and glorious and he laughs. And then all of the eyes that he is looking through turn on him, and they see every single facet of his being, and he wants so desperately to scream but his mouth isn’t his anymore. 

“Ah,” says Jonah, through lips that used to be Elias’. “I’m going to be making some  _ changes  _ around here.” 

The first thing that happens is he poisons James Wright. Elias used to hate the man, but he watches through Jonah’s eyes as James gets older and sadder every single day, worn down by years and by coffee cups laced with arsenic, and if Elias could cry for him he would. Jonah improves Elias’ work ethic, makes it very clear to his colleagues that he is now no-nonsense, and becomes a far more positive office presence than Elias ever knew how to be. He doesn’t actually help anyone, of course. But he’s very good at acting like he cares. 

Elias watches as Jonah jumps through all of the right bureaucratic hoops, signs the right papers, and bribes the right administrators, and when James finally dies he sits in the back of Jonah’s mind in the office he spent years getting lectured in. 

The donors all send delegations to welcome the new Head of the Institute, and to pay their respects to James, and Jonah smiles at them all innocently. Until Simon Fairchild shows up, Elias is certain that no one is ever going to know what happened to him. 

He’s an old, decrepit-looking man, but with more bounce in his step than Elias ever had while he was corporeal. He smiles at Jonah, and bobs his head, and looks harmless and friendly until Jonah leans forward and says, quite clearly: “Hello, Simon. I told you I’d be back.”

Simon Fairchild falters, and blinks. Then his lips spread into a wide, malicious grin. “Jonah Magnus?” he says. “Is that Jonah Magnus in there?”

“Yes.”

“What did you do with the other poor chap? What’s his name, Elias?”

“Oh, he’s in here,” says Jonah, and then: “Elias, I don’t suppose you want to say hi?”

All of a sudden, Elias has his body back. For the first time in seven months, he breathes air and blinks with eyes that he’s in charge of. His gaze focuses on the smiling old man in front of him. “ _ Please, _ ” he whispers, because it’s all he can think to say, “please help me. Please, please get me out of here.”

Simon chuckles, his eyes light. “Oh, Jonah,” he says, “that’s one for the books.”

And then Jonah is back, and Elias feels himself cast out of his own body once more. “Yes, well,” says Jonah, business-like, “I had to do something. He’s all that was available.” 

“The Lukases are going to have a field day with this,” says Simon. 

“Oh, I know.” Jonah leans back in the chair, tilting his head. “I don’t suppose I deserve a donation increase for this?”

“Practically,” says Simon, “it is very funny.”

_ What?  _ thinks Elias wildly. He thinks at Jonah a lot, and Jonah rarely bothers to acknowledge him.  _ What’s going on? Is he like you? _

“The real Elias wants to know if you’re like me,” says Jonah, smirking slightly. 

“Does he know anything?”   


“Not a thing.”

“Oh, Jonah,” Simon says, tutting, “that’s very rude of you. You took over the poor chap’s body and haven’t even bothered to explain what’s going on. Did he ever read any statements?”

“Not a one!” says Jonah cheerfully. “And, Simon, I know it’s awkward, but I’d be obliged if you’d call me Elias from now on.”

“Of course, of course. I know how it is. Elias. It’s a good name.”

“The last name is better. The family of Elias Bouchard is quite well off.”

Simon laughs, and plops himself down on the chair facing the desk. “Isn’t it so much more convenient, being rich?”

“Indeed. It will be far more convenient when all of his relatives begin to die of strokes.”

There’s a snowglobe on James’-- Jonah’s-- desk, and Simon picks it up and tosses it a couple of times. “You should really explain things to him. He must be so confused.”

“Would you like to?”

“Oh, fine, fine.” Simon leans forward in his chair and looks Jonah in the eyes. “Hello, Elias,” he says cheerfully, and the snowglobe thuds onto the table. The plastic snowflakes are gone, replaced by a sky just the wrong shade of blue that seems far too large for the trinket. “You’ve been taken over by an avatar of an eldritch god that feeds off of the fear of being watched. It probably hurts a whole lot. I’m sure Jonah’s enjoying that very much.”

This is worse than anything Elias has been through so far: to be seen, for once, but to be mocked. For someone to know what has happened and to  _ not care.  _ He hates Simon Fairchild more than he has hated anyone in his life, even Jonah. Jonah has always seemed like something from another world, cold and ethereal and ghostly, and after all Elias had been the one to open the book. Simon Fairchild is a kindly-looking old man and his laughter feels sharper than any of the horrific things Jonah has done. 

_ I suppose the Lukases will be by soon,  _ says Jonah to him after Simon has left, later that evening.  _ I wonder which one it will be.  _

_ The Lukases? Aren’t they donors?  _ asks Elias. 

_ Yes. They serve the Lonely.  _

Elias doesn’t bother asking. He knows Jonah likes to keep him in the dark, presumably to feed his ego. And at any rate he finds out the next week, when the temperature in the office suddenly dips and fog creeps in under the door. 

“Hello, Mr. Lukas,” says Jonah distractedly, without looking up from his paperwork. Elias’ consciousness hovers somewhere over his left shoulder-- there’s been less and less space for him inside the body recently, and he has found himself forced to watch events from several inches outside the skin. 

“Hi,” says someone, in a mildly shocked tone of voice. Elias can’t make him out at first, but eventually he phases out of the background and into the foreground. He’s medium-height, freakishly pale, with a long overcoat and a beanie on. “I’m Peter Lukas? I’m here to meet with the new Head of the Institute.”

“Yes,” says Jonah, and looks up, “I know. I’m Elias Bouchard, it’s a pleasure to meet you.”

Peter Lukas squints at him. “Do I know you?”

“Perhaps,” says Jonah, “perhaps not. It’s been quite a while. And it’s not like anything was ever official.”

“I’m sorry?” Peter glances around, as though there’s someone else in the room Jonah could be talking to.

“Peter.”

Elias can see the second the truth hits him: Peter’s eyes widen, he takes a step back, and rubs his hands together nervously. “Jonah?” he croaks.

“Yes. But it’s Elias now. It’s nice to see you.”

“Oh,” says Peter. “Uh, you too. Are you-- are you mad at me?”   


“I don’t think so, no. You had so much you were afraid of being revealed, and I wasn’t a very lonely person. The scales weren’t even.”

Peter breathes in, long and deep, and when he opens his eyes they’re clear and cold. “Something’s different now.”

“Oh, Peter,” says Jonah, and the words sound fond coming out of Elias’ throat. “I think you’ll find Elias Bouchard is the loneliest man on the earth.”

**Author's Note:**

> haha its all fun and games until you feel bad for og elias


End file.
